Neurimmune and Ono Pharmaceutical extend drug discovery partnership

Leveraging Neurimmune’s reverse translational medicine (RTM) technology platform, the alliance will create antibody therapies against new treatment targets in the neurodegenerative disease field.

RTM technology platform is a distinctive antibody drug development method.

The companies signed the initial drug discovery partnership in November 2017 to identify and develop human antibodies utilising the platform.

As part of the latest partnership, Neurimmune and Ono intend to create and establish human-derived monoclonal antibodies against recently identified therapeutic targets of Ono.

Ono will gain exclusive global rights to develop and market the antibody products resulting from the partnership.

Under the agreement, Neurimmune is entitled to receive an upfront payment, research fees, milestone payments based on meeting research and development goals, apart from royalty payments on product sales from Ono.

Neurimmune CSO Jan Grimm said: “We are excited to expand our long-term trusted partnership with Ono, a global pioneer of innovative medicines.

“The joint goal of the collaboration is to discover novel drug candidates for the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases using RTM technology.”

Aducanumab, a human monoclonal antibody discovered by Neurimmune, eliminates amyloid beta from the brains of Alzheimer’s disease patients. It was later licenced to Biogen.

Ono Pharmaceutical Discovery & Research senior executive officer / executive director Toichi Takino said: “We extremely appreciate Neurimmune’s RTM technology platform as an excellent antibody creation technology through our drug discovery projects.

“Through this new collaboration, we will expand our central nervous system disease portfolio and work to deliver innovative medicines to patients with neurodegenerative diseases.”